Weekend in Manhattan
I got the 6AM regular Amtrak train, sleeping on and off till arrival at Penn Station some four and a half hours later. I walked up 8th Avenue past the New York Times Building (where my office is located) and to the Westin Hotel which I had decided to treat myself to the night before. From there I took a cab to 86th and 5th for my rendezvous with Alfredo at the Neue Galerie. We reviewed the permanent exhibit from Klimt to Klee and realized that we both had seen it a number of times before. The singular advantage of old age is that one forgets and it seemed like seeing it all for the first time. Marveling at Mrs. Block Bauer’s $35 million price tag and reading the description of theft by the Nazis during WWII and finally and only recently an Austrian court deciding to give it back to the Block Bauer family who promptly sold it to the museum. No slouches they.
We had lunch at Café Sebarsky. Bavarian bratwurst and potato salad. Alfredo had a lovely chestnut soup to start with. We walked up 5th Avenue past the mobbed Metropolitan Museum of Art and tut tutted at all the fast food carts clustered at the bottom of the sweeping stairs. It was a beautiful day and to me spring-like and warm but eventually Alfredo started to feel the cold in his newly purchased South American antelope suede jacket. We cross the avenue to the other side where the French Embassy is because in their lobby is a sculpture which was recently confirmed as a genuine Michelangelo. So we peer in through the windows and get a good look.
Finally, Alfredo is shivering with cold so we get a cab over to 3rd Avenue where he lives. His apartment is rent-controlled and he has lived there for 35 years. Dominic who used to be his partner now lives in the studio apartment adjacent to his apartment. Hugo who is Mexican lives with him as houseboy/major domo. He has lived there for 8 years.
Alfredo and Dominic go about preparing dinner. We had bracciole with a big tubed pasta and tomato sauce. The pasta was perfect and with an accompanying salad, it was a delicious meal. Dessert was strawberries on shortcake, the latter having been doused with Gran Marnier to a point that the shortcake seemed incidental. After that Hugo hailed me a cab and I repaired to the Westin and my lovely king size bed. I was exhausted having been up since 5AM. To say I slept like a baby would be no exaggeration.
Next day I go over to the Oak Room at the Plaza Hotel to meet Dick Thomas. Dick is an American from Pelham, NY originally who I met in London in 1972. I was working for Wasey Cambell Ewald Advertising at the time and one day he just showed up looking for a job. He interviewed with my boss, George Playfair, and was hired on the spot. He was in our public relations department. So over all these nearly 40 years we have kept in touch and occasionally meet up. I last saw him and his wife, Lin, last November in London at their daughter Molly’s lovely wedding.
I arrived early at the Plaza and decided to go for a stroll through Central Park. The pond glistened in the autumn sun, the trees dazzling in their yellows and oranges, autumnal colors on a perfect Indian Summer day. The ducks swam backwards and forwards and the snapping turtles sunned themselves in the midday warmth. Clarinetists competed on every corner and tourists from every country in the world crowded the walkways and perched on the benches taking photos of each other.
Finally the appointed hour arrives and I hop over to the Oak Room. I enter through the main door. I want to get a sense of the place after recent multi-million dollar renovation. The doormen are splendid in their uniforms with gold epaulets and smart peaked caps. I walk past the now silent Palm Court that in the old days would have a live orchestra and tea dances in the afternoon. To the Oak Room, virtually unchanged since I was a child. I step in and all of a sudden I have an unbidden memory: me at 11 or so years old with my young sister in tow having spent the morning at the Museum of Natural History and walking in to get my father who is sitting at the bar, drinking a martini. He would hide out there while we got our bit of culture.
Dick is there seated at the bar. I join him. We exchange pleasantries. We take a cab to Park Avenue for our lunch at Artisanal, a French restaurant which he has selected. We might as well have been at the departure lounge at Kennedy airport. One could barely hear the other it was so noisy.
Anxiously I look at my watch and at 3PM tell him I must go; swift goodbyes and off I go to Penn to catch the train back. It is an easy 6 block walk down 32nd Street. Fully sold out train though. I get the last seat in the Quiet Car. Home by 8PM. It was a fun weekend.